We’re excited to announce that a new case study – “Boosting Energy Efficiency for Small Businesses” – is now available for download. The latest case study dives into the development of the Small Business Improvement Enhanced (SBIE) program, which aimed to bring tangible energy efficiency benefits to Dominion Energy’s small business customers in Virginia and North Carolina – especially those who are hard-to-serve.

From 2016 to 2020, Dominion Energy and Honeywell ran the successful Small Business Improvement (SBI) program, one of the most enduring energy efficiency initiatives in Virginia and North Carolina, achieving over 49,610 MWh of energy savings (150 percent of the plan). The program was able to issue $9.2 million in incentives and reach over 2,500 customers, many of whom could be categorized as hard to reach and hadn’t previously participated in energy efficiency programs.

In early 2021, building on this previous success, Dominion Energy introduced the next iteration as the “Enhanced” Small Business Improvement program (SBIE). Recognizing the critical support small businesses needed to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, the program included an expanded list of eligible measures and created outreach materials in multiple languages – including Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean – to better connect with non-English-speaking customers.

From June 2021 to June 2024, over 2,550 small businesses in North Carolina and Virginia participated in the Small Business Improvement Enhanced program, saving approximately 8,476 MWh – an average of 6,545 kWh per participant. To date, over $7.1 million has been distributed to customers. In addition, after redesigning the previous small business program to the new “enhanced” design, Dominion Energy achieved a 34-percent increase in applications and saw a 50-percent increase in adoption of measures beyond lighting.

With the addition of the new case study, there are now 46 success stories available in our archive from a wide range of electricity providers across the United States and Canada, including Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), Ameren Illinois, Cobb EMC, Duke Energy Florida, NB Power, ComEd and Consumers Energy.